Talk With The World is a site created by a couple of language nuts for the use of practicing our selected languages and discussing things that might spark an interest in someone. If you, too, would like to join us, send an email to ever4one@gmail.com ^^

Jul 15, 2008

One thing that learners of Balinese will notice is that they will rarely encounter the language in some type of written form - it's more of a spoken language, although this situation is rapidly changing. For a language scholar such as myself, I've had more exposure to written Balinese, but the struggle is kept to a minimum since Balinese is presently predominantly written with Roman script. However, there is a resurgence of Aksara Bali/Tulisan Bali 'Balinese alphabet/Balinese script', which is largely based on the Brahmi scripts of South India. (You might have seen other examples such as Thai, Devanagari, Khmer, Tamil, and the like - all these are based on Brahmi.)

The story is this, basically: most Balinese learn the script during their formative years in SD (elementary school), but most soon forget this afterward. The only types of text where this script regularly appears are traditional religious texts and treatises, usually incised on dried strips of palm leaf called lontar. NB: This is where Balinese gets its curvaceous nature - any extended straight line would tear the palm leaf.

Brahmi scripts are difficult to understand on the one hand - they are usually described as abugida, which simply means a syllabic-based alphabet where all consonants have an inherent vowel. In order to change the vowel, one must add specific diacritics to the original consonant.

So, how does Balinese do that? Well, let's take the first letter, ha, which is:

This, of course, has the inherent vowel /a/. In order to change this vowel, diacritical marks must be added to this consonant.hi:

hu:

he:

ho:

Now, another complication in Brahmi-based scripts is the fact that traditionally, words were not separated by spacing; only clauses and paragraphs were. Additionally, since there are plenty of "closed syllables" (i.e. syllables that end in consonants) in Balinese, there is a lot of potential confusion with using a syllabic alphabet when it comes to consonant clusters. For example, if one had to write panak Sri 'Sri's child', it would be incorrect to write:This transliterates to *panakaśari, which doesn't mean anything in Balinese. So, Balinese and other Brahmi scripts have developed alternate forms of these consonants, which are usually referred to as conjunct consonantal forms. Thus, the most appropriate way of writing this would be pa-na-kśri, with the ś and r in their conjunct forms (which in turn "kills" the inherent vowel of the two first consonants in this cluster, i.e. kś):And then one last example, this time with multiple clusters - the common benediction/greeting in Bali Om Swastyastu 'May all be well'. It is usually written Om (its own special symbol since it is so ritually charged) Swa-stya-stu:Inggih wantah asapunika mangkin. Titiang mapamit dumun.

It's indeed beautiful but how close is this typeface to the actual writing? the font seems written with with a flex nib (not the best choice for palm leaves!) a la Copperplate script only with horizontal swells. Do you know what the writing instrument was for such a delicate surface?

First, mature lontar palm leaves are dried in the sun, stripped, and then cut into appropriate lengths. Then, a small knife or stylus called a pengropak/pengutik is used to incise the script. The incisions are then blackened by rubbing roasted candlenuts (or kukui, if you're familiar with the Hawaiian name) onto the palm leaf.

Hi Ed, I find you EVERYWHERE these days, I'm just starting to teach myself Aksara Bali from the Elem School Books, got the idea this morning ,a key on the internet would sure be helpful! It was REALLY difficult the past three weeks without a good one!! Thanks, Meme J.

"Kelod", right?Well, I can't post responses with Balinese script here in the comments section, so I will just tell you what characters you need, and then see if you can glean them from the Omniglot page.

- [ka] with pepet [e] diacritic- [la] with [o] conjunct (remember that [o] has stuff on either side).- [da] with an adeg-adeg (vowel killer)

Hope this helps.

Meme J,

Kenken kabare! Tiang becik-becik kemanten.

Yeah, elementary school books are a good way to start. Hope to hear from you more often! Suksema banget!

Im looking to get a tattoo in Balinese Script of the words Strength (being able to hold ones own etc) and Passion (relating to passion for life and love etc) can someone be so kind as to provide me some info on the balinese script version?

Hello,I'm looking how to translate this proverb "Berat sama dipikul, Ringan sama di jinjing" in balinese and as well as in aksara. I have found the informatic script on the babadbali website. I just need to know which characters I may use.Please answer me on ildao(at)hotmail.comThank you for you help.have a nice day

I have been looking for someone to write 4 words in aksara Bali for the longest time for a tattoo I intend to get.. words are: daughter; sister; wife & mother.

I would like to have it tattoed in the manner mandarin scriptures are written in; each character placed below the previous. If anyone could help me with this would be great.. please contact me at LATEEHS84@GMAIL.COM

Talk With The World is a site created by a couple of language nuts for the use of practicing our selected languages and discussing things that might spark an interest in someone. If you, too, would like to join us, send an email to ever4one@gmail.com ^^

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Cody

Cody is a 19 year old male that lives in America and is currently studying Korean, Japanese, Chinese (Mandarin), and Spanish. His main focus is Korean but he is also interested in Japanese and thinks Chinese sounds cool. Spanish is there because it is required for his college and he kind of likes it (a little bit). In his spare time, he likes to listen to music, watch movies, play video games, practice his languages (duh~), and Jog.

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Theresa is a 20 year old female who lives in Singapore and is currently taking Korean as a third language, her first being English and second being Mandarin. She took Korean in 2005 and gradually fell in love with the language. Some of her favourite pasttimes would be reading novels, shopping and more shopping.

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Ed

Ed is a self-described eccentric graduate student of linguistics from California. He currently focuses on Balinese and Indonesian, but has also studied the following: French, Japanese, Tagalog, Korean, and
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Nicholas is 20 year old Filipino male living in the Gold Coast, Australia. He has called himself "The Language Freak," and most of his close friends probably agree that this name is appropriate. Aside from his native languages English and Tagalog, he can speak pretty good Mandarin and Japanese, and can survive with some Korean and Cantonese. He hopes to learn some Spanish too! The only thing Nick enjoys more than language learning is eating, and karaoke!